


b l o o m

by sapphireswimming



Category: The Hero Series - Moira J. Moore
Genre: Book 3: Heroes Adrift, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Fluff, Missing Scene, Much Needed Pep Talks, One Shot, Post-Book, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:34:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,108
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28226205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphireswimming/pseuds/sapphireswimming
Summary: Lee anticipated the need to readjust after their return from the Southern Islands, but hadn’t considered just how deeply Taro had been impacted by their time away
Relationships: Dunleavy "Lee" Mallorough/Shintaro "Taro" Karish
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	b l o o m

**Author's Note:**

  * For [cthulhu_with_a_fez](https://archiveofourown.org/users/cthulhu_with_a_fez/gifts).



> It looks like this is the first fic in the fandom to be published on this site. While I’ve only heard the series referred to as “Source & Shield,” Moore’s Wikipedia page lists titles in “The Hero Series” so that’s how this is getting listed
> 
> Set directly after, with spoilers through, Book Three: _Heroes Adrift_
> 
> Title from _Hanahaki_ by molly ofgeography, a song words-writ-in-starlight mentioned felt very appropriate for Taro and Lee's relationship

The journey to the Southern Islands had changed them.

Lee had known that, and had been prepared for a brief period of readjustment after stashing her scanty sparkling beaded costume where it would never see the light of day and locking the memories of her barely-under-control firelight performances into just as tiny a box in the back of her head.

Then all that was left was slipping back into normal clothing – sturdy, practical clothing and oh how good it felt to be back in an outfit that she was comfortable in – and start saying _yes_ again, instead of _kai_.

Simple enough.

Now that they were back, Lee had assumed that Taro would also slide right back into the grooves of his previous life before long, spending his free nights at parties hosted by rich people and immediately extricating himself from their sort-of-relationship as soon as he’d found a more suitable devotee.

One who could match both his station and his good looks.

Lee was zero for two on that score, and unable to do anything about either. It was inevitable that Shintaro Karish, Stallion of the Triple S, would seek a relationship with someone more worthy of him now that she wasn’t literally the only person he knew on the entire landmass. The only reason they’d gotten together in the first place was that they spent an entire year in a foreign land, with nothing else of home but each other, and no way for word of their relationship to return unless they said a word. She had no delusions that that chapter of their life would come to a close as soon as they stepped foot back upon familiar soil.

Much as she loathed the idea of his moving on from her, Lee had long resigned herself to the eventuality. Upon their return to High Scape, she’d put away all traces of their journey, and along with that meant putting more distance between them – sleeping in her own room and leaving him free to spend his time with the best that society had to offer.

But he hadn’t taken advantage of it as much as she’d expected.

The few functions he’d attended seemed to be more out of duty than anything else, and he would return from these revelries early in the evening - early enough that she was still awake, writing letters at the desk or pouring through a good book on the couch – with an uncharacteristic scowl on his face.

Even around her, he’d been less than his usually charming self. To the point that she’d considered, in some deep part of her brain that she would never allow to voice itself, using the phrase “downright mopey.”

She didn’t know what was going on to make him act like this, or why, weeks later, when she was making her way downstairs, she caught a glimpse of him out of the corner of her eye that made her stop mid-stride.

The door to his room was partially open and, through the crack, she could see Taro standing very still and very quiet as he stared at himself in a mirror. He was unusually subdued, hands at his sides and a furrow in his brow that certainly wasn’t doing anything to help his features.

Lee frowned.

Back in the early days, when she’d first met Taro and had believed most of the rumors about him, she might have thought he was examining his features to better be able to sing their praises to the flocks of young women who hung off his arms and every word.

But she knew better now and knew, also, that this was a far cry from his usual morning routine, checking his reflection to ensure that he was as neat and presentable as possible before he stepped foot out into the outer world.

No, even if she didn’t know quite what she was seeing, she was certain that something about the scene playing out in front of her was very wrong. Even though she couldn’t be sure why.

Much as her role as a Shield meant placating the populace when needed, interacting with individual people remained a much more complicated dance, one to which everyone else seemed to know the steps and refused to tell her before yanking her onto the dance floor and slamming her with discordant music from competing bands.

People could just be so very, very confusing sometimes.

She didn’t often wish she was better at this sort of thing. At understanding, and at saying the right thing, but that was mostly, she supposed, because there were so very few people in her life that she cared enough about to want to help when they stood despondent and listless in their rooms.

She did care about Taro, though.

Zaire, but how she cared about him, no matter what she told herself, or how hard she tried to brace for the coming blow when he made it official that they were over, and that everything that had happened on the island was a fantasy – part dream and part nightmare, in turn, but a fantasy nonetheless. One that was over now that they were both back where they belonged.

So she stood in the hallway for a few minutes, just watching to see what he did. But he didn’t do anything. Didn’t even seem to notice her.

Very odd, even by Source standards. Even by Taro standards, and that was definitely saying something.

She strode across the floor, crossing her arms as she leaned against the door.

“What are you doing?” she asked.

She hadn’t expected the near-flinch at the sound of her voice, or the way Taro looked up in alarm, desperately trying to school his face into something more pleasant before she could see his gloomy reverie.

His tentative smile faltered when he realized how close she was and that he was already too late.

“Ah,” he said, both hands running through messy strands of his long black hair. “Right, well, I was just…” he trailed off.

Lee looked at him, then to the mirror, then back to him. “What?” she asked when he still didn’t move to answer. “Checking to see if you’re still as handsome as ever?”

Taro froze, then laughed a little. The sound was bitter, and brittle. She hadn’t ever heard him laugh like this before, and quickly decided that she really didn’t like it.

“Well, yes, actually.”

Her eyebrows rose.

“It’s just that –” his eyes cut back to the mirror for a second, fingers twisting around each other until each knuckle went white.

When he next opened his mouth, it was like a floodgate had opened. “It turns out that I’m not even as good looking as I thought I was. Which sounds awful, I know,” he rushed to assure her as her eyes grew wide. “And it’s not like I necessarily ever wanted to be the best looking person in a room…

“It’s just. I already have so very little going for me, you know –”

Lee blinked because she really, really didn’t.

“With the Shield doing all of the downtime work for the pairs, and no family responsibilities to speak of, all that I seemed to be capable of doing myself was walking into a room and making it a bit brighter. I could always count on being able to charm the people around me if I needed to. Calm them down a bit, or make them willing to listen, or make them feel better about themselves, or…”

He trailed off, both hands running through his hair again.

“But now I don’t even have that! I’m just. So goddamn _useless_.”

He gave another strange bark of a laugh.

“It’s not even a _skill_ ,” he said. “It’s just my face and there’s nothing I could even do to improve it. Can’t learn how to be better looking, or train to have better looks. It’s the most talentless skill I can possibly imagine, but it was something that I _could do_ and now –” he waved his hands useless in front of him.

“Even _you’re_ -” he said, voice swelling with emotion. Then, quickly broke off, “Never mind.”

Lee frowned but Taro was quick to continue, plowing ahead before she could pay too much attention to what he’d almost said.

“It’s not just- the thing is that it wasn’t just… every single person on the island, you know? Ever since we came back, everyone here hasn’t looked at me the same either, and –”

Lee canted her head. “Well, that one’s easy to explain,” she said, and he fell silent mid-tirade, his chest heaving a little as he caught his breath, but at least he’d exerted enough control to stop talking and turn his attention toward her.

“That’s because you disappeared for a year and came back all tanned,” she said, plainly. “And besides, you haven’t stopped moping whenever you _do_ go out. You know what… what rich people are like. They like to talk about anything that’s out of the ordinary. And that gives them plenty of reasons to talk about you. But I can guarantee that however they’re looking at you, it’s not because something’s suddenly unattractive about your face.”

Taro watched her for a moment, then turned back to the mirror, leaning closer to peer at himself in the glass as if he was trying to find something he’d missed before. He was close enough that he puffed fog against the surface with every breath.

“But how can you _tell_?” he asked, the plaintive note in his voice so clear despite the most obvious answer in the world literally staring him in the face.

Lee stared at him for a moment in disbelief.

“Taro.”

“What?” he asked, eyes locking with hers through the reflection in the mirror.

“Taro,” she said again, and walked forward until she was standing close enough to put a hand on either side of his face.

He started to draw back a bit, eyes moving back and forth between them. “What is it?” he asked again, warily.

“You know that you’re gorgeous, right?”

Taro stopped and stared at her.

“Beautiful?” she tried again, and when his expression simply melted into mild confusion: “Handsome?”

He raised an eyebrow.

Lee sighed heavily, her thumbs idly rubbing across his high cheekbones, the way she had on the island during the meager periods in which they’d found themselves alone. At the movement, his lips parted and he pressed his cheek into her left hand, nearly nuzzling into it.

“The people on Flatwell were stupid,” Lee told him bluntly. “And blind. And I have no idea how in the world they couldn’t see it because you are, literally, and listen up because I cannot believe I need to say this, but. You are. The most. Good looking person that I think I’ve ever seen in my life.”

Taro’s jaw fell open and he stared at her in such outright shock that it was her turn to stare warily.

“What?” she asked.

He grinned, then, a beautiful, bright smile that split his face until he was absolutely beaming at her.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Lee asked, starting to pull away, but he quickly reached up to grab her hands before she could retreat fully.

He shook his head, smiling too wide to reply.

Instead, he dropped his hands to either side of hers and drew her closer. One hand moved to curve around the small of her back and she realized what he was doing even before his eyes flickered down to her lips.

She didn’t even think of fighting it, even though part of her recognized that it probably would have been the smarter thing to do, in the long run.

But gods, she loved him, and loved the way he kissed her, the way they seemed to melt together while she was in his arms, the way he could drive thoughts out of her head for brief shining moments of happiness so all-encompassing that there simply wasn’t room to think about anything else.

He leaned down further, closing the distance between them until they were so close that she could feel his breath, softly puffing against her skin. His other hand cupped the side of her face and then continued slowly moving across her neck and up into her wild mass of red hair until he could guide her lips to be angled just so.

She stared up at him, breathing just as hard as he was now, and marveling at how bright he looked when he smiled like this, smiled like he really meant it, smiled like there was nothing else in the world he would rather be doing than this.

Gods, she didn’t know how she could bear to live without it once it was gone.

He was still smiling when he finally kissed her, his lips pressing into hers, softly at first, and then more insistently.

For a moment, for just one more moment, Lee decided to forget that their relationship would be coming to an end any day now, and kissed him right back, her fingers moving up to tangle in the loose strands of his silky hair as he kissed her again and again and again.

When she finally pulled back, Lee’s gaze fell away to the mirror, where she could see them both smiling, cheeks flushed and hands entwined in each others.

She cleared her throat a little, and tried to regain some sort of equilibrium. “Not that I’m complaining, but… what was that for?”

Taro was still grinning like an idiot. “Oh, nothing,” he said. Then immediately corrected, “Well, not nothing. In fact, something that is very much something.”

She looked at him expectantly.

Somehow, his grin widened as his hand caressed her cheek once more. “Because you’ve told me that I’m pretty.”

“Ugh,” Lee groaned at the revelation.

“And gorgeous,” he continued.

“Stop,” she demanded, starting to pull away.

“And –”

“And this is why I’m never going to tell you anything of the sort ever again,” Lee said, still fighting to keep the smile from breaking out. She was serious about this, damn it. “Seriously, there’s no need to preen like a peacock just because you’re good looking.”

“I’m not!” he protested.

Lee stood still long enough to arch an eyebrow.

“I mean, I guess I am,” he said. “But I’m preening because _you_ said so.”

She would have thrown her hands up into the air if they were free. “Literally everyone says so!”

“Not you.”

That stopped her short for a minute. “What,” she asked, “and you remember every nice thing I say, is that it?”

“Yes,” came the immediate reply, his face completely earnest.

Lee stared at him for a long moment.

And then it was broken as Taro cracked a grin, looking like his old, cheerful self again. “All five nice things you have ever said to me,” he said, placing a hand against his forehead dramatically. “Shall I recite them to you, my love?”

Lee was trying not to laugh now, one hand over her mouth as she stepped away.

“The words of love you have spoken to me?” Taro asked. “I can list them all in alphabetical order. Or chronological, if you’d rather. Or, in increasing magnitude for how they make my heart a’flutter upon recollection. As I reflect upon your frowning face as you begrudgingly admit that I am, in fact,” he turned beneath his daintily positioned wrist, “quite beautiful.”

Lee frowned. “I don’t frown when I say nice things.”

He laughed.

“And besides,” she continued, “you shouldn’t need me to tell you that when everyone else in the world seems to be tripping over themselves to compliment you.”

“Ah,” Taro said, straightening up to look at her seriously again. “But it doesn’t matter what everyone else tells me. They don’t normally mean it, but you do. You always mean what you say. You and all the people on that damned island,” he laughed mirthlessly for a second, but it passed quickly and then he was smiling gently down at her. “But don’t worry. I value what you say a hundred, a _thousand_ , a _hundred thousand_ times above anything they said.

“And now that you’ve said I’m handsome…” he trailed off with a grin. “And not only that, but the best looking person you’ve ever had the good pleasure to gaze upon, well, then I suppose I’ll just have to act accordingly.”

“Oh, Zaire, save us all,” she breathed, putting a hand up to the doorjamb to steady herself. She took the next few moments to stare at Taro, at his flushed face, his wide smile, the way his hair fell, tousled, across his shoulders.

Her first thought was how much she loved this man, how much she absolutely adored him. And her second was that she didn’t think she could forgive anyone who dared to tear down his sense of worth or dim the brightest smile she’d ever encountered.

Her jaw set as she remembered how cavalierly the people on Flatwell had dismissed this man as not only plain, but _unattractive_. And didn’t hesitate to tell him so. They didn’t have a working pair of eyes among the whole lot of them.

“That damned island,” she muttered.

When he looked at her expectantly, she added, “Only good thing to come of that entire trip was Aryne.”

Taro grinned. “Speaking of,” he said, “have you heard from her lately? How’s our charge faring at my dear old fortress of a school?”

Lee heaved a heavy sigh.

Both of his eyebrows rose into his hairline. “That badly, huh?”

“Well,” she waved a hand around vaguely. “You know how it is. And she’s got… a lot of things to get used to.”

“That’s putting it mildly. But she did survive all by herself on that island before we found her. And we know how clever she is.”

“Right,” Lee huffed. “So now we’ll just have to see if she can survive being bottled up in endless etiquette classes with a dozen other Sources-in-training.”

“Hmm,” he hummed. “Well, do send my love the next time you write, won’t you? You can tell her that the _most beautiful man you’ve ever known_ wishes her –”

Lee moved close enough that she could shove her hip straight into him hard. He staggered a step sideways, catching her as he went and pulling her flush against his side as he regained his balance.

Then he placed a kiss on top of her head and danced away out of reach before she could catch him again.

He was still laughing as he disappeared down the stairs.


End file.
